martes, 9 de abril de 2013

Time Capsule Apartment

For 70 years the Parisian apartment had been left
uninhabited, under lock and key, the rent faithfully paid but no hint
of what was inside.

By Henry Samuel in Paris
Published: 7:49PM, 04 Oct 2010 Images: Getty

Mrs de Florian, a ‘demimondaine’ never returned to her Paris flat after the war and died at the age of 91 in 2010.

Behind the door, under a thick layer of dusk lay a treasure trove of
turn-of-the-century objects including a painting by the 19th century
Italian artist Giovanni Boldini.

The woman who owned the flat had left for the south of France before the Second World War and never returned.

But when she died recently aged 91, experts were tasked with drawing
up an inventory of her possessions and homed in on the flat near the
Trinité church in Paris between the Pigalle red light district and
Opera.Entering the untouched, cobweb-filled flat in Paris’ 9th
arrondissement, one expert said it was like stumbling into the castle
of Sleeping Beauty, where time had stood still since 1900.“There was a smell of old dust,” said Olivier Choppin-Janvry, who
made the discovery. Walking under high wooden ceilings, past an old wood
stove and stone sink in the kitchen, he spotted a stuffed ostrich
and a Mickey Mouse toy dating from before the war, as well as an
exquisite dressing table.But he said his heart missed a beat when he caught sight of a stunning tableau of a woman in a pink muslin evening dress.The painting was by Boldini and the subject a beautiful Frenchwoman
who turned out to be the artist’s former muse and whose granddaughter
it was who had left the flat uninhabited for more than half a
century.Giovanni BoldiniThe muse was Marthe de Florian, an actress with a long list of ardent
admirers, whose fervent love letters she kept wrapped neatly in
ribbon and were still on the premises. Among the admirers was the
72nd prime minister of France, George Clemenceau, but also Boldini.The expert had a hunch the painting was by Boldini, but could find no
record of the painting. “No reference book dedicated to Boldini
mentioned the tableau, which was never exhibited,” said Marc Ottavi,
the art specialist he consulted about the work.When Mr Choppin-Janvry found a visiting card with a scribbled love
note from Boldini, he knew he had struck gold. “We had the link and I
was sure at that moment that it was indeed a very fine Boldini”.He finally found a reference to the work in a book by the artist’s
widow, which said it was painted in 1898 when Miss de Florian was 24.The starting price for the painting was €300,000 but it rocketed as
ten bidders vyed for the historic work. Finally it went under the
hammer for €2.1 million, a world record for the artist.“It was a magic moment. One could see that the buyer loved the painting; he paid the price of passion,” said Mr Ottavi.